Page 13 of All My Broken Dreams

“And you don’t?”

Her face grew hot. “Not so much. I take after my father. Harry never knew his real dad. He died when he was a baby. My mother remarried and my dad adopted Harry.”

“So Listowel is your father’s name.”

“Yes.”

“What was Harry’s family name before he was adopted?”

“I don’t know. My mother never talks about it. I’m not sure that even Harry knows.”

Deacon sat back, carefully wiping his mouth on his napkin, which was really just a paper towel. “Okay, that could be useful to find out. Admission to Locksley is through a family member. If he has family on his father’s side in Scotland and it was through them that he got accepted, they might know where he is.”

Robbie lowered her fork, unable to take another bite. She had to hand it to him. Her savior was a smooth and skillful liar.

Chapter Seven

“Ididn’t think of that,” she said, her chest tightening. “He could have gone to visit them and that’s why he’s gone dark. Our mother was against him having any contact with his father’s biological family.”

Deacon’s eyes were hooded and glinting in the low light. “Why is that?”

“She won’t say. My mother doesn’t like to talk about her first husband or his family. It’s always been a closed subject in our household. I assumed it was for our dad’s sake, but after he died, she became even more upset when Harry brought it up.”

“So Harry was interested in meeting his father’s family?”

“My brother is all about family. That’s why we were worried when we didn’t hear from him. It wasn’t like him to drop out of sight.”

“He might have changed since his arrival. University and living abroad changes students. They start thinking for themselves.”

“He was always independent. I didn’t mean that. I mean he wasattachedto us.”

“And to you especially, I think.”

Unexpected tears burn behind her lids. “He constantly worried about me. He said I was like Laura Wingfield inThe Glass Menagerie. Closed up in my attic apartment, playing with my collections and dreaming my dreams.”

“Was he right?”

“No. I have no dreams.”

Deacon didn’t speak for several minutes but Robbie could feel his eyes on her. “It’s a demanding schedule at Locksley Hall. It can be hard for some students to keep up. Maybe it became too much for him and he decided to check out for a few weeks.”

“That sounds like something a depressed person would do. Was Harry depressed when you met him?”

Deacon looked at her, startled.

“I’ve never met him–not that I know of, anyway. I was just spitballing, throwing out a random guess. I don’t know anything about your brother.”

“Don’t you? You have a bottle of prescription medication in your cabinet with my brother’s name on it, but you don’t know whether he was depressed or not?”

She threw down her fork and pushed away from the table. “What’s going on here? Where is my brother? Why are you lying to me?Who are you?”

Deacon had never felt so large and ungainly in his life as he reached around the table to clear their plates. As a young man playing hockey, his size positioned him to play defense. The enforcer. Hit the opponent and hit hard. His size was no help to him now. What he needed was the vocabulary of Alastair Manderville or the sophistication of his son, Deacon’s cousin, Casey.

Casey Manderville would know exactly how to handle Robbie Listowel.

“I told you who I am.” He avoided looking her in the eyes. “I’m the janitor at Locksley Hall. That’s as good as it’s going to get for me. Money is always tight. Guys like your brother come to me for drugs–some illegal, but most are hooked on prescription medication. Students at Locksley don’t come from rank and file families. They’re under a lot of pressure to succeed. The drugs help out with that. They pay me, I keep them supplied and no one in their family has to know.”

“You’re telling me you’re a drug dealer,” she said flatly. She crossed her arms over her chest but her face was wan.

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